Ice Cream Castles
by Penumbratica
Summary: Elsa Candell is living for her dying mother- but money is tight, and the illness is rare. Now 16, she turns to her only hope of supporting her; relying on her own untapped and unique magic as she travels around the kingdoms. Somehow she becomes entangled within conspiracies-and sometimes, confectionary- along the way. As her journey goes on, will the end taste bittersweet?


The feeling of dough between her fingers, the smell of sugar and freshly baked bread sticking to her skin, the pleasant heat emitting from an oven- Elsa had loved baking, ever since she had been a small child.

Her mother had always encouraged her exploits-although in the beginning, they had lead to the distinct scent of burning in the air left behind, mingling with Elsa's own bitter weeping.

But her best learning had sprung between the cracks of her failures, was watered by her tears. Elsa had found a recipe came out best when she did it her own way: two spoonfuls of sugar, a dash of courage, and the triumphant snap of a golden biscuit in the air. Rich, warm chocolate melting luxuriously in your mouth? Utterly, deliciously, worth it.

Then magic came into the equation, the star attraction of any display. With a glimpse of its whimsical brand of designs, Elsa had been enchanted. Like a girl with her face pressed against a shop window, her eyes were glued to the treasures behind the glass, wider than ever.

Really, she should have never known of them, being a middle-class town girl way out in the countryside. A place where everyone was relatively safe. And sheltered.

Forgotten.

But Prominence, that transcendental thing that gave the people magic, had shifted. Times were changing. Normally it was the kingdoms had all the powers, sung about and celebrated, noted in the history books that Elsa would dutifully recite for tests. Children like her sang while skipping or throwing stones, rhymes going;

 _Sun, Moon, Jewel, Flame,_

 _Raindrop, Sea, then Windmill came._

That, Elsa understood. But nobody she knew, least of all herself, knew what they meant by powers, and classifications, and it had driven her curious nature mad. So her mother sat down with her one summer's day to explain it all.

"Well," she had begun, "Magic classifications come in four different ways. Elements, Summoning, Manipulation, and Qualities..."

Elementals are those who can control the elements: Fire, Water, Earth, Air, and so on. They draw their power from what makes up this world. In fact, he founders of the seven kingdoms were all actually Elementals in their own rights.

Summoners can, well, as their name suggests, summon things and objects- but their abilities are always personally different, between precision, numbers and everything in between.

Manipulators are a little more tricky, though. They can either give their subconscious intelligence to things and control them or just control them period. It's a pretty broad term.

Finally, Qualities. They're just ways you can be more than a normal, baseline human-like hitting harder, or running faster, or even flying. They tend to be secondary powers the most. Powers can overlap, but that's different from having a secondary power.

"So…that's it?" Elsa didn't know how she felt about that. Disappointment? Indifference? The mystique was gone, the mystery vanished, the sweets clearly displayed before they were tucked away in the same old cupboard.

"Yes, that's it. You can run along and play, now, Elsa."

And for a while, it was. She went back to the way things were before, and the years went by in a haze of cinnamon. All was relatively well.

Until Elsa Candell made a gingerbread man talk.

That, she muses now, sounds like it was her town-shattering event, something that had changed her forever. The inciting incident. But she hadn't meant to.

It had just been an attempt to try something she could never get to taste quite right, on one of those days where her emotions felt like they had been whisked and stirred until there was nothing but dregs left behind in the bowl. She'd sifted the flour, harshly battered an egg until it fell in, her own humming and its sharp cracks the only sound in the house.

Until her creation-big button chocolate eyes and a sad face- had called out.

In her shock, Elsa hadn't been able to understand a word of the tiny thing, and she never would. Because after it's cry, the gingerbread man had tried to escape through the closed kitchen door, the impact scattering it's pieces across the floor. Only Elsa having to sweep the crumbs away later made her believe that it couldn't have been a hallucination. But...

She hadn't meant to.

The seasons came and went, and her mother's cold became a deadly illness.

"She has The Affliction." a local doctor had said gravely, eyes furrowed in concern. They had been standing in the same room, but until then, Elsa had never felt so far away.

"Now her body needs magic to survive. A lot of magic, Elsa."

"Is-" she paused, throat dry. "Is there a cure?"

The doctor sighed. "...Yes. It's very expensive and costly for everyone involved, sadly, because nowadays The Affliction is so rare. I can prescribe some pills to emulate the effect, but without any professional healers, that's all I can do. I am so, so sorry."

"It's okay," lied Elsa. And she carried on.

So, here she was now. Her life could be packed up neatly in a suitcase, an entire world of memories slipping between clothes and shoes and tear-stained letters.

Everything she knew- the birds flying sky-high above the clouds, that cafe place where she'd laughed herself sick, the lingering warmth of her family-was trapped in herluggage. Elsa didnt know if she would start to laugh or cry.

["I'm so proud of you," her mother had whispered before she'd left, frail hands wrapping around Elsa in a feather-light hug. Endings were supposed to be easier. But life wasn't a story.

If it was, she had turned a new page.]

Next Chapter: Elsa registrates in the Gem Kingdom, learns a bit more about powers, and has an encounter of the sticky kind.

Thanks for reading!


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